Haven't had as much time for blogging, since its the holidaze.
But I have been storing up songs, so you're in luck.
~*~
First, a song about Daisy's childhood. Yes, this is about MY MOTHER, and all those other mouthy beehive-hairdo white trash ladies of the 60s ... I miss yall so much. (And especially during the holidays, I always miss my mama terribly.)
In my lifetime, I have gone from embarrassment over this song (amazingly accurate, thought the 12-year-old me, how did Tom T. Hall KNOW THIS ABOUT US??????), to giggling-glee and pride, to tearful nostalgia. Its from another time. This could never happen now.
But hey, really: it used to happen. My mother was a bit more colorful in her language than ole Tom's lyrics could be in 1968.
A sentiment I have often had, about people I love... it was such a surprise to hear the same feelings come from a man.
Delightful, sweet and very honest.
I wish I was your mother - Mott the Hoople
~*~
For you headbanging kidz, I remembered to bring the punk.
This song comes highly recommended; it once destroyed one of my friend's car speakers.
New Rose - The Damned
~*~
Next up, a song about my husband's hometown:
Little Feat - Oh Atlanta
~*~
Big finish!
Despite copious promises, I never have updated my old INSTRUMENTALS post, which continues to get hits from desperate music-lovers looking for the names of ancient, wordless tunes ... and so, as a consolation prize, here is a stunning instrumental tune you have probably heard many, many times, done with consummate class and finesse by Jeff Beck.
My very favorite version of the jazz classic first written and recorded by Charles Mingus in 1959.
Its been awhile since I shared some old music with yall.
This first one was on the soundtrack to the movie "Car Wash" (1976)--which I once reviewed for the (very) long-defunct Focus Rock Entertainment, back in the day. I wrongly predicted it would be a hit; instead, the theme song "Car Wash" was the big hit. (sigh) But it did become a funk classic and was popular in the discos, as the B-side of the hit ballad from the film, "I wanna get next to you."
Produced and written by the late, great Motown-powerhouse, Norman Whitfield, this song features the legendary funk bass of Lequeint 'Duke' Jobe--an amazing groove. All punctuated with beautiful big brass noise, which defines 70s funk for me.
To this day, now and forever, when someone says "put your money where your mouth is"... I mentally finish the sentence: "or you ain't said a damn thing"...
I know I have played this here before, probably more than once. Its one of my favorite pieces of instrumental music, ever.
(PS: Link for those who missed the old instrumentals post! I never did get around to posting part 2, so consider THIS part 2.)
Although I love the original studio version (and most live renditions), the Allman Brothers video clips currently on Youtube have some fuzzy audio and are not as good as simply listening to (Allman Brothers guitarist) Dickey Betts play it as an 8-minute guitar lesson (with his son Duane) for Guitar World magazine... elegant, spare, and oh so lovely.
They have to slow down at around the 3:45 mark (the "second theme"), where it gets somewhat complicated and psychedelic. Other than that, this version is almost good enough to stand on its own.
In Memory of Elizabeth Reed - Dickey Betts
Aside: I didn't know Betts had named his son Duane, which gets me rather choked up.
~*~
Time for working class proletarian bluegrass. You can blame the election. Class consciousness uber alles!
You old black gold you've taken my soul
And your dust has darkened my home
And now that we’re old you're turning your back
But where else can an old miner go
It’s Big Leatherwood and it’s Algoma Block
And now it’s Blue Diamond too
The pits they are closing - get another job
But what work can an old miner do
John L. had a dream but it’s broken it seems
And the union is letting us down
Last night they took away my hospital card
Saying why don’t you leave this old town.
LAKE WYLIE (AP) — Water with traces of a radioactive hydrogen isotope has again leaked at a South Carolina nuclear power plant, but the spill hasn’t made nearby drinking water unsafe, according to federal regulators. According to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, more than 100 gallons of water containing tritium leaked over the weekend during maintenance at the Catawba Nuclear Station in York County. Water was being pumped from the main condenser to a site collection pump, and the water in the pond overflowed, officials said.
Duke Energy's continuing negligence is going to be the ruin of us.
~*~
Currently watching BLACKFISH, the searing (and long-overdue) CNN documentary about the treatment of "killer whales" (orcas) by SEA WORLD. Quite honestly, I am watching intermittently. When it gets to be too much, I switch over to something tolerable.
The documentary has sparked a whole new debate about taking kids to animal parks, about which I have always been ambivalent. As an animal rights-advocate, the practice makes me almost hyperventilate. And yet, I know how important it is for children to SEE animals, the better to appreciate the habitats and creatures we want them to preserve, protect, and possibly save from extinction. We want them to love the animals, and we hope this experience will nurture that love.
But... what about the animals?
Please don't miss BLACKFISH, even if you have to skip over the violence/abuse/neglect every ten minutes or so. It is worth knowing and remembering.
~*~
Music Time! This is one of the best instrumentals of the 70s, I was glad to finally locate it.
We were a bit off our game today, since Gregg and I had to soldier on without Double A. Next week, I am going to Texas, and they will have to soldier on without ME... so I am not complaining.
I just get nervous when we change anything.
~*~
Just back from Atlanta, where I caught a very personal story in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (unfortunately, behind a pesky paywall, or I would link it) about the former Miss Georgia, beautiful Leighton Jordan. In the AJC account, Jordan's eating disorder is presented in stark, primary colors. It was harrowing; the unending treadmill of ballet, pageants and thinness seemed less like the life of a princess (the fairy tale we all hear about) and more like being caught in a trap.
In her work as Miss Georgia, Jordan describes a personal appearance wherein she spies a 13-year-old girl, very thin and obviously "jittery" as she is confronted with a table full of food. Jordan takes the girl aside and tells her that she needs to hear her story.
It was an amazing moment of sisterhood, self-sacrifice and love.
I promise never again to be mean to the pageant-participants. Jordan has redeemed you all.
Speaking of marijuana (doing radio has taught me the importance of a good segue!), Erin Tatum's feminist review of "We're the Millers" at Bitch Flicks accurately articulates my concerns about the movie, which I haven't yet seen (but I have been subjected to oodles of trailers):
Really, you are lying to yourself if you thought the powers that be would waste any opportunity to showcase Jennifer Aniston's legs. The ensuing montage is pure wet, slow-motion fan service. The dance ends with Rose releasing a steam valve, disorienting their captors enough to let their "family" escape. I'm torn about this scene because although it's trying almost too hard to show that strippers can be smart and intuitive, Rose’s most valuable asset is still her body and her ability to be objectified. I take issue not so much the objectification itself so much as the fact that the definitive aspect of Rose’s character seems to be “LOL WHAT 40+ and still hot?!?”. Certainly Aniston's boldness and athleticism are praiseworthy, but given the amount that the actors talk about it in interviews, you would think the strip routine was her sole appearance.
~*~
I am greatly looking forward to Elysium, a new film containing one of my very favorite scifi plots ever: Earth evacuated by the rich as a festering shithole, while only the poor, sick and unlucky are left behind. This was a favorite theme of my beloved Philip K Dick, as in his great masterpiece Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, which became the film Blade Runner. (It is also the scenario in The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, a novel of obsessive importance to your humble narrator.) Elysium was directed by Neill Blomkamp, the director of DISTRICT 9.
Unfortunately, Elysium is getting rather mixed reviews, even though it easily won the weekend box office. I still intend to see it, so stay tuned.
The Conjuring got on my nerves, because I really wanted to like it.
~*~
And for you musically oriented folks: I finally "cleaned up" my infamous three-year-old instrumentals post... I profusely apologize to the people who Googled "instrumentals" (which are notoriously VERY HARD to find, since there are no lyrics to look up) and came upon my post with so many songs missing. I blame YouTube! (Again, time to plug the invaluable YouTomb, a fascinating website that chronicles the whys and wherefores of various videos getting the plug pulled.)
I especially got a chock full of searches after MAD MEN used "Love is Blue" over their closing credits in one of this past year's shows.
And so, here it is.
Love is blue (L'amour est bleu) - Paul Mauriat (1968)
I have never posted this before, and just realized it! My deepest apologies! Its one of my very favorite pieces of music, originally written by jazz trumpeter Nat Adderley. My parents' band also played it. Everybody played it in the 60s, at some point.
As regular readers know, I loved the late, great Mr Mike Bloomfield, and his Chicago blues-guitar sounded just phenomenal here.
It's a long instrumental, but its real purty, too. ("Richard Betts pickin on that red guitar!") Relax, breathe, and visualize yourself right next to a waterfall.
It won't be hard to imagine at all.
High Falls - Allman Brothers Band
~*~
I've heard this one a lot on this blog's namesake, the indispensable Uncle Dave's Dead Air. GREAT STUFF!
The article in The State [Columbia, SC newspaper] also reported that [John] Frampton [head of South Carolina's Department of Natural Resources] retired in 2012 after conflicts with Caroline Rhodes, then the Chairperson of the Board that oversaw the Department of Resources. Rhodes had been appointed to her position by Republican Governor Nikki Haley. The DNR climate change study pre-dated the Haley administration. Although current DNR officials are claiming that the refusal to release the study is not politically motivated, it's hard to accept their denials at face value. The report was on track to be released until Haley, a Tea Party favorite, was elected as South Carolina's governor and appointed her own people to the DNR Board after assuming office in 2011.
The only logical conclusion is that her administration quashed the climate change report prepared by the state's own scientists based on political considerations.
Smalley’s life has become a mission to stop bullying, and youth suicide. Kirk now spends his days telling his son’s story at schools around the world. He has told Ty’s story at more than 500 hundred schools and has talked to hundreds of thousands of students, teachers, and school administrators since Ty’s suicide nearly three years ago. He said,
We do it because we don’t want another family to live our nightmare. Laura doesn’t ever want another mama to find her baby the way she found ours. We don’t want another kid to ever feel the way Ty felt, that that was the only option. We’re not doing it for Ty. We’re doing it for all the other kids out there. The main part of our message is not to stand silent and watch it happen and that’s addressing the bystanders. If we can empower those kids to be willing to stand up and say ‘you know what – this isn’t right. It’s not funny,’ then we’ll greatly outnumber the bullies. One kid, one voice can make a difference.
Government sources say the Justice Department will by day's end articulate a legal position in the so-called Proposition 8 case, a ban by California voters over same-sex marriage that is now being challenged in the Supreme Court. At the very least, the administration will express general support for gay and lesbian couples in that state alone to wed.
That case and another appeal over the federal Defense of Marriage Act will produce blockbuster rulings from the justices in coming months.
Gay rights groups have privately urged Obama and his top aides to go beyond his previous personal rhetoric in support of the right and come down "on the side of history" in this legal fight. Those sources tell CNN that Obama has made the final decision over whether to file a brief and what to say.
As of earlier this week, there was still internal debate among White House and Justice Department staff about whether the president should take the big step and say there is a constitutional right of gay and lesbian couples to wed. The administration was also considering a compromise position -- affirming previous support for same-sex marriage, at least in California, while conceding other states may have the option to ban it.
After two months in military jail in Kuwait, Manning was moved to the US Marine brig in Quantico, Virginia, on July 29, 2010. He was held there in maximum security confinement for nearly a year, where he sat alone in a cell for 23 hours per day and was denied a pillow and sheets. An online petition at Avaaz.org received more than 500,000 signatures calling for President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to "end the torture, isolation, and public humiliation of Bradley Manning." And in February of this year a UN report from Juan Mendez, the special rapporteur on torture, concluded after receiving information from the US government about Manning's treatment that "imposing seriously punitive conditions of detention on someone who has not been found guilty of any crime is a violation of his right to physical and psychological integrity…"
~*~
I heard Toubab Krewe last night, on the namesake of this blog, the indispensable UNCLE DAVE'S DEAD AIR. Loved em! Sharing their musical genius here... apparently, they play frequently at the Orange Peel in Asheville (their hometown), and I am fervently hoping to get up there to see them in the future.
This is an acoustic set recorded live at The Festy Experience, October 2011. Their electric sets are just as impressive.
YouTube abruptly yanked my favorite Isaac Hayes song, thereby ruining my 2008 obituary post for Hayes. Boo. Hiss. (PS: I just edited it back in, so at least it's intact for now!)
I am happy to report that someone else has kindly uploaded this lovely gem, and I am hereby sharing it while I have the chance. LISTEN NOW, before the evillll corporate meanies steal it from us, and/or the uploader's account expires.
Smooth and nice as gravy on rice. When I think of the 70s, I think of music like this.
Isaac Hayes - Ellie's Love Theme (SHAFT soundtrack)
Time for tuneage! (Or is it spelled tunage?) Here are my earworms for the past few weeks; I've been delinquent in not sharing! A variety of styles represented, you should be able to find at least ONE you like.
~*~
In this strangely-staged video, Steve Winwood looks like a boy scout. Come to think of it, he still does. Also, I know he is talking about tribesmen, but I always think of Marvel comics Headmen. I blame my spouse for that!
40,000 Headmen - Traffic
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I debated whether I should jeopardize my musical cred by playing a JOURNEY song ((gasp)) -- an 80s-era secret guilty pleasure of mine, along with Duran Duran. I figured if they were good enough for Tony Soprano, they're good enough for me. Just listen to these purty power chords. (my favorite is at 1:07-14---yowee!) And check out that utterly flawless, bang-up finish.
I love this because it brings back the period surrounding my second divorce quite vividly. Ironically, I wasn't having any fun at the time... but your youth is still your youth, even when it sucks... and one day, believe it or not, you will wax nostalgic over even the suckiest times.
The Girl Can't Help It - Journey
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Did I say Duran Duran?
It is notable that (unlike today) all of the women in this video appear to be of a reasonably healthy weight.
Girls on Film - Duran Duran
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You can close your eyes - James Taylor and Carly Simon
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I frequently quote Billy Jack on blogs ("I try, I really do") and only recently discovered the kidz never even heard of him. Admittedly, I forced my daughter, Delusional Precious, to watch Billy Jack when she was 14 or so (the age I was when I saw it), and she rolled her eyes during most of it. So, I will simply show this montage of clips with the theme song, which you may have heard before.
Time out for hippies!
One Tin Soldier (theme from Billy Jack) - Coven
~*~
There are several excellent versions of this on YouTube, including a great live one w/Crazy Horse, but I wanted the one with fiddles, horse-clopping sounds and Nicolette Larson. (R.I.P.) And whaddaya know, I found it, played right off the record. :)
Comes a Time - Neil Young w/Nicolette Larson
~*~
I was planning to save these last two for Instrumental Oldies, Pt 2, but decided to play them now... since it appears I will never get around to fabled Part Two. I was doing pretty good to post the first one!
Time is Tight - Booker T and the MGs
~*~
Not everyone has an iphone to tell them the names of songs! Whenever this gets played in the store where I work, someone asks me who it is. This was the 'official' video; the original song was well over 7 minutes. (Again, the presence of dancing women of healthy weights! Pretty radical stuff!)
Hey you crazy kidz, hope you all have a great New Years celebration planned. And resolutions, lots and lots of good-hearted resolutions, that make us feel all warm and fuzzy (at least until we break them).
This year has seen DEAD AIR's lowest number of blog posts ever, and one of my resolutions is to post more, even if the posts are short. I don't have to turn everything into a damn epistle! But alas, old habits die hard.
The important thing is the HABIT, I have discovered. If you let a few days go by without writing, well... it's easier to let a few MORE days go by... and finally, you aren't writing at all. That's how it initially happened to me some years ago, when I went long periods (like, years) without writing. I missed chronicling some very important, earth-shattering events, and I now greatly mourn the loss. (We can't remember everything we were thinking/doing ten years ago, even if we believe we do; I re-read parts of this blog from only three years ago and I am astounded at the details I have forgotten already.) I decided I wouldn't let that happen again, but this year, I nearly did.
As many of you know, my spiritual center (so to speak) was re-centered (so to speak), and I found it hard to adequately convey my thoughts and feelings around the shift in sensibility. I still find it very difficult, and I am largely unable to write sensibly about leaving the Church. It remains a jumble of emotions and I need to let it all settle, before I attempt to go there. I have about a half-dozen unfinished posts regarding sudden realizations I have had, re: Christianity and identifying as Christian. For one thing, a loss of respectability, that 1) I didn't know I had and 2) didn't know I valued. Some of this respectability is social, some political, and some is self-respect, and that last one is the one that caught me off guard.
I still identify as a Catholic in a social/ethnic way, and that is also very hard to quantify. I am not sure I even understand what it means, but it is simply true.
And so, forward into another year...
~*~
Two of Cravin Melon, but not sure which two! (They introduced themselves as "2/5 of Cravin Melon" at the Earth Fare benefit for Harvest Hope Food Bank, Thanksgiving Eve.)
I am currently waiting for the cops to arrive to arrest me for not deleting the troll's angry posts (!), as I have been assured they are on the way.
Today, I drove home at breakneck pace and the only thing I found was two florescent light bulbs outside my door, to install in the kitchen. *sigh* No cops. No subpoena. No indictment. Galdurnit! (as my late uncle liked to say) It appears I got all my hopes up for nothing.
I was planning a really JAZZY end-of-year post about Freedom of Speech and blogging, complete with trolls sending me to jail after posting their addresses on my blog (seriously, read the link)... but nah. I was also hopeful that this would be a big First Amendment case, endearing me to all of Blogdonia (and bringing me thousands of hits, of course), but it all turned out to be just another annoying pain in the ass.
~*~
Tyler Ramsey at the Bohemian Cafe in Greenville, December 4th. His musical compatriots, BAND OF HORSES, have just been nominated for a Grammy award, which he called "Some crazy news!" It certainly is!
Congrats on the nomination, Tyler, and good luck. (Apologies for the blurry photo, but it was kinda dark in there.)
~*~
I did want to link a few people who posted especially interesting, fun and/or very readable stuff that I didn't get to highlight previously:
But to some the fascism warned of in all those faint allusions to totalitarian horrors already exists and the death camp trains have been running for decades with barely a peep from the professional liberals. Should we care about Obama’s failure to close Guantanamo when he never felt pressure enough to even lie about wanting to shut down the Corrections Corporation of America? Prisons and the racist legislation, hyper-policing, brutality and fraudulent judicial system that keep them filled are among the nation’s biggest businesses. Joblessness and poverty continue to worsen and even the tens of thousands dying from war abroad are more than matched by the deaths in this country resulting from public policies which deny adequate housing, food and health care to millions.
Speaking of which, I've been a loyal REAL HOUSEWIVES fan since day one, but this year, I was pretty disappointed in the newest incarnation: The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Boring, predictable, with no authentic or amusingly-outrageous neurosis at all, just garden-variety, high-tax-bracket narcissism. Narcissism without neurosis is just... narcissism. Neurosis, however, is what makes the world go round! (We crave copious tearful, self-centered confessions about how no one understands what they go through!!!!) The Bev Hills gang doesn't have enough self-pity to suit me... or it could be that they've had SO MUCH BOTOX they are totally unable to move their faces (the husbands too!) and as a result, cry with their eyes wide open. And that just doesn't pull at my heartstrings in the same way.
If you can't even scrunch up your face and cry like the rest of us, fuck you.
:: Sheila instructs us in Relearning how to breathe. As a customer service rep, I would often notice that my breathing would get all raggedy and strange, after an hour or so of getting my ass chewed out non-stop. I would take a few seconds and concentrate on breathing in and out, and I was amazed at the difference in my state of mind, my countenance, my inner calm.
I hate the confusion that surrounds my birthday now. People constantly getting confused, “so which birthday do you celebrate?” “When is your real birthday?” Since finding out the truth, I would rather deny my birthday all together, no celebrations, no worries about what or how birthdays are supposed to feel to someone who does not even know how to think of her own birth. It only marks another year that I have spent separated from pieces of myself that may or may not even exist; pieces of my self that made me, created me, but don’t know me now. It only marks a deep sadness at having celebrated something that was so wrong for so long, something that wasn’t real, the way sometimes entire decades of my life have felt.
And now (((drum roll))) DEAD AIR VIDEO OF THE YEAR... as always, my criteria is the same: Which one did I listen to the most after I initially posted it?
I haven't had as much time to blog, because I've actually started hiking again. I started slow, and I am now up to about an hour and a half before I completely collapse. My beloved azaleas are in bloom, and it's a beautiful spring!
My goal is to someday be able to climb a real mountain again. At this admittedly-slow rate, it will be at least another year, but I am fervently hoping for next spring/summer... and I promise if I ever again get to the top of Table Rock, I will take oodles of photos for DEAD AIR--so you will all believe me!
~*~
As I said in this post (fabulous music awaits you at the link), the kids used to ask me the names of songs... but yesterday, I had to ask one of them. As you all know, it is impossible to Google lyrics from an instrumental song, since they have no lyrics. (sigh) Stranded, desolate and desperate... the pretty music plays on and on and you can't ever find it again. One 60s-era instrumental arrangement, in particular, has been haunting me for several months now. Upon hearing it again, I scurried over to the work-area of said young person, who then held his handy-dandy iPhone up to the speaker broadcasting my long-lost tune. Held the phone up, said the old lady, amazed...do you believe that shit?
Answer, within about 10 seconds: Cleo's Mood, by Junior Walker and the All Stars. (I have helpfully provided the long-lost song for you below. You knew I would.)
And that's what I mean about becoming obsolete. My musical memory is certainly no match for an iPhone application! Somehow, it makes me feel sad and exhilarated, all at once. I guess this is how the old mule skinner felt when he saw the Model-T Ford: Wow.
Just for that, adding Muleskinner Blues to our mix. (Just listen to her hit them high notes!!!)
~*~
Believe it or not, it was once considered pretty radical stuff for a woman to sing this song. (Notice she is careful to say she is a lady mule skinner.) Typically, Dolly takes a classic male song (about a male occupation!) and makes it totally her own, singing it far better than any man, with that Tennessee-wildcat soprano of hers. I've always loved this!
And for the record: It does not get more country than this, so if you don't like country music, do not listen. Really.
Mule Skinner Blues - Dolly Parton
~*~
My long-lost Motown instrumental! Brought to you by... the wonders of modern technology!
(Is this the coolest thing you ever heard or what?)
Cleo's Mood - Junior Walker and the All Stars
~*~
Last, but not least.
I grew up with this song, and I always think of it when any coal-miner is hurt. Dedicated to the miners in West Virginia, and their families; I'm sure lots of people are thinking about these words right now... and my prayers are with them.
Dark as a Dungeon (written by Merle Travis)
Oh come all you young fellers so young and so fine
Seek not your fortune in a dark dreary mine
It'll form as a habit and seep in your soul
Till the stream of your blood runs as black as the coal
Well it's many a man that I've seen in my day
Who lived just to labor his whole life away
Like a fiend with his dope and a drunkard his wine
A man will have lust for the lure of the mine
Where it's dark as a dungeon and damp as the dew
Where the danger is double and pleasures are few
Where the rain never falls and the sun never shines
It's a dark as a dungeon way down in the mine
And pray when I'm gone and my ages shall roll
That my body would blacken and turn into coal
Then I'll look from the door of my heavenly home
And pity the miners digging my bones
Where it's dark as a dungeon and damp as the dew
Where the danger is double and pleasures are few
Where the rain never falls and the sun never shines
It's a dark as a dungeon way down in the mine
After much consideration, I chose the best music video posted here over the past year. My criteria was simple: which one did I listen to the most after I posted it?
The winner!
This is from my "instrumentals" post, and as I said then, it contains what might be the greatest organ riff in history. It also features amazing legendary session musician Steve Cropper on guitar.
As some of you have undoubtedly figured out, the problem with purely-instrumental songs is: No lyrics, so you can't look them up online.
And so, I've decided to play some instrumental oldies ... chances are, you've heard these tunes your whole life and never knew the titles.
One of the most pleasant parts of aging is knowing these arcane remnants of pop-culture. Young people I work with invariably call me on the extension: What's the name of that? (I am regularly called on to identify all kinds of music, spanning decades.) I have included a couple of tunes here that I am always asked about, as well as special favorites of mine.
Presented in more or less chronological order! Enjoy!
~*~
Stephen King used this song in his horror movie Sleepwalkers (1992), which is what I once believed the title to be.
Sleepwalk - Santo and Johnny (1959)
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My parents played this in their band. I can't hear the bass line without thinking of my mother...
Walk, Don't Run - The Ventures (1960)
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Before you all object to the bullfighting motif, check the title! The bull has won and is now all alone in the ring... he's a lonely bull.
The Lonely Bull - Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass (1962)
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Grab that surfboard!
Pipeline - The Chantays (1963)
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You've heard this one in countless TV commercials. Fantastic vintage visuals!
Music to watch girls by - the Bob Crewe Generation (1966)
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Baby-boomers who grew up with the "ABC Movie of the Week" in the 70s, will recognize this as the theme song. Burt Bacharach named the song after his daughter with actress Angie Dickinson, named Nikki, who later committed suicide.
Nikki - Burt Bacharach (1966)
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A big favorite of Mr Daisy's:
The Horse - Cliff Nobles and Co. (1968)
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Love is blue (L'amour est bleu) - Paul Mauriat (1968)
A Time for us (Theme from "Romeo and Juliet") (1968)
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Another well-worn TV-commercial tune...you've always wanted to know the name of it!
Outa-Space - Billy Preston (1972)
~*~
Daybreaker - Electric Light Orchestra (1973)
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Big finale! Originally recorded in 1968, this is a live version from 1991. I was looking for the original when I found this, and of course, I simply couldn't settle for less.
I think this might be the greatest organ riff in history. Also check out legendary session musician Steve Cropper on guitar.
Hang em High - Booker T and the MGs (live 1991)
And I hereby promise, one of these days I'll get around to pt. 2 and beyond! :)
For those of you who have always wondered what this haunting, bittersweet piece of piano-music is called, that's the title.
Etched in my memory, I have visions: A young man with a DA haircut accompanies a young woman with a poodle skirt... neon signs reflecting in dark puddles, late at night, as the couple leave the bar to cuddle in the warm car, motor idling. Maybe they turn on the car radio, and hear this song.
They were my parents.
Not sure how I got the memory, unless it was just so strongly conveyed by their presence. No matter how nasty they brawled, even after they divorced, they would be brought together by the song. (Yes, they continued to see each other long after they were divorced and married to other people, plural. I'll get around to writing about THAT convoluted and complicated state of affairs, one of these days.)
When my mother heard the song, even decades later, she would always politely excuse herself to go to the restroom. (And shed tears for my father, no doubt.)
This song, recorded in 1960, was used in country-and-western-bars (and maybe still is, in some areas) as a "last call"--a signal the bar was closing; time to drink up and leave. Folks would often dance this song with their ex-lovers, or someone they believed they would NEVER have as a lover. They would dance with their best friends' wives, in full view of the best friend. Women would also dance with each other (men never did). The song was transcendent; it said "We have shared this space and time together, and now, this night is over." Something about the wistful melody made the saloon-denizens suddenly thoughtful, quiet, melancholy, sentimental, aware of their mortality. People might break out in fights during rowdier songs... but never this one. Last date signaled a graceful 'good night'--an always-tender parting of the ways.
I just love it.
It's best listened to VERY LATE on a Saturday night... maybe 2:30 am, when the bars in my hometown closed.
